Hind Sight
by PagetPaulson
Summary: He did what he thought was right. He was protecting his family.
1. Chapter 1

"No!"

Hotch didn't try and fight the hands of the officers who handcuffed him in the center of his living room, the roughness of the metal cutting into the skin of his wrists. He knew what he had done, and there was no fighting it.

Emily pushed through the officers who were trying to hold her back. "Aaron," she husked, her hands on his arms. "Aaron don't let them do this."

"Ma'am, step away from the felon."

"Felon?" she breathed, tears running down her cheeks and hitting her lips. "He didn't do anything!"

Hotch fought the empty feeling in his chest at the sound of his wife's sobs ripping from her throat. "Emily, let me go."

Emily's eyes widened. She let out a breath and felt herself stiffen, watching as the officers led him through the house and out the front door. "Wait!" She moved as fast as her feet would carry her and sprinted out to the front yard. "Aaron!"

"Emily, let them take me in. I'll call you when they allow it."

"Aaron," she growled, eyes puffy and red as she stopped the officers before they could take her husband to the patrol car they had waiting for him. "Aaron what is going on? Why are they doing this?"

The father of two tried his best to keep his eyes off of the crying woman. "Emi-"

"Where are you taking my husband?" The FBI agent forced the officers surrounding her home to look at her, and Emily hardened her eyes on all of them. "I have a right to know why you're doing this."

One of the officers looked to Emily with a raised brow.

Emily felt the veins in her neck popping out as she struggled to breathe. "We're special agents in the FBI. I have the right to know," she ground out.

The taller one of the two officers handling her husband gave Emily a look of disapproval. "Ma'am, your husband shot a man in cold blood. Special Agent Aaron Hotchner is under arrest for first degree homicide."

"Homicide?" she breathed, her hands on her five month pregnant stomach as her husband was walked past her and to the police car. "Are you fucking kidding me?" The agent spun on her heel and watched as Hotch was pushed into the back of the car. "Aaron!"

Hotch shook his head. "Don't stress," he forced out, his chest tight at the look of pain on his wife's face. "It's bad for the baby."

"Aaron, who did you shoot?" Emily could hear her voice wobbling as she walked to the car. "Why would you do that?"

"Ma'am step away from the car."

Emily yanked her arm out of the grip of one of the officers and looked at her husband with those dark eyes he'd fallen in love with. "Who did you shoot?"

Looking up to the wrecked woman, the father of two flexed his wrists in the handcuffs. "Matthew Martinez."

She could have burst into another set of tears as she watched the cruiser drive her husband away, the others officers that had come to the home following behind it as they made their way to the precinct. How could he do that?

Emily covered her quivering lips with her hand, hearing her children screaming from inside the house.

He had shot her rapist.


	2. Chapter 2

"Mr. Hotchner, I-"

"Agent."

Officer Collins glared at the lawyer who sat beside Hotch and cracked his neck. "Agent Hotchner," he corrected. "I'm going to ask you again; why did you shoot Matthew Martinez?"

Hotch kept his eyes on the handcuffs that attached to the underside of the interrogation table. "He raped my wife."

Officer Collins sat himself back down. "Now was that so hard to say?"

The lawyer beside the FBI agent held up a hand, feeling the anger radiating off of his client. "Do not patronize him, officer. I can have you brought up on many different charges for mocking the rape of his wife and not treating him with the respect an agent of his caliber deserves."

"Who the hell said I was mocking?"

"How the man feels is how the feels. If Agent Hotchner believes you are joking about the rape of his wife I can easily bring it to the attention of your superior."

Collins hardened his gaze on the lawyer before turning his attention back to the suspect. "Agent Hotchner, tell me what happened." They knew he had shot Matthew Martinez and why, but they needed more than that to be able to convict him on the charge they were chasing.

Sitting with his shoulder strong and stiff, the father of two scratched his nails over the tips of his fingers. "My wife was kidnapped almost a year ago. It took us a while to find her," he almost croaked. He still couldn't picture the love of his life going through such torment without having his stomach toss and turn. "She was starved and tortured and raped, and when we finally found her we found out that she was pregnant. Martinez was going to jail but was still out on the streets until his court date."

"But there was no threat."

"There would have always been a threat," the angered FBI agent argued. "He raped my wife! He was going to be able to fight for custody of her child! How is that not looked at as a threat?" Feeling the hand of his lawyer on his shoulder, Hotch cracked his neck and told himself to keep quiet.

Officer Collins grunted, sitting back in his chair. "So you killed him."

Hotch kept himself still. "I was protecting my wife; my family."

"Did you go to Martinez's house with the intent of killing him?"

That was it: the one answer that could either convict him or have him be seen as innocent. If he were to be convicted of homicide in the first degree then Emily would be left to be a single mother of three for possibly as long as time could tick on, but if it was seen as self defense then he could be back at home with his family. His beautiful family.

"No," he lied, looking the officer dead in the eye. "No I did not."


End file.
